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joewein.de LLC
fighting spam and scams on the Internet
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"419" Scam – Advance Fee / Fake Lottery Scam
The so-called "419" scam is a type of fraud dominated by criminals from Nigeria and other countries in Africa. Victims of the scam are promised a large amount of money, such as a lottery prize, inheritance, money sitting in some bank account, etc.
Victims never receive this non-existent fortune but are tricked into sending their money to the criminals, who remain anonymous. They hide their real identity and location by using fake names and fake postal addresses as well as communicating via anonymous free email accounts and mobile phones.
Keep in mind that scammers DO NOT use their real names when defrauding people.
The criminals either abuse names of real people or companies or invent names or addresses.
Any real people or companies mentioned below have NO CONNECTION to the scammers!
Read more about such scams here or in our 419 FAQ. Use the Scam-O-Matic to verify suspect emails.
Click here to report a problem with this page.
Some comments by the Scam-O-Matic about the following email:
- This email uses a separate reply address that is different from the sender address. Spammers use this to get replies even when the original spam sending accounts have been shut down. Also, sometimes the sender addresses are legitimate looking but fake and only the reply address is actually an email account controlled by the scammers.
- This email message is a 419 scam. Please see our 419 FAQ for more details on such scams.
- This email lists free webmail addresses. Use of such addresses is typical for scams. Lotteries, banks and any but the smallest of companies do not normally use such addresses. Criminals use them to anonymously send and receive email at Internet cafes.
- elizbeth.patels@yahoo.com (Yahoo; can be used from anywhere worldwide)
Fraud email example:
From: "Elizbeth Patels" (may be fake)
Reply-To: <elizbethpatels@gmail.com>
Date: Thu, 18 Jan 2024 18:41:08 -0800
Subject: YOUR ATTENTION IS NEEDED
Hello Dear,
I am Elizbeth Patels, I am the the owner of Hope and Care Humanitarian organization. www.helpandcare.net
I am seriously sick and have decided to close down the humanitarian home, I can no longer run it and wants to donate the entire money of the humanitarian home to you if you are ready and can promise to carry on with the good work of helping humanity.
I do not intend to keep the money belonging to this humanitarian home, because a big part of it came from donations made by different people and we cannot use such money for our personal problem.
If you are interested or think you can do this, let us know so we can we can discuss properly.
I just wants to hand the whole donation over to someone i can can trust.
I wait to hear from you.
Your sincerely
Elizbeth Patels
Help and Care Humanitarian Organization.
Elizbeth.patels@yahoo.com
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Anti-fraud resources:
